


take a walk on the wild side

by tazernkaner



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: College AU, Drunk idiots, M/M, a rare occasion where I’m not writing angst, frat party
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-06
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2019-07-27 03:28:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16210460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tazernkaner/pseuds/tazernkaner
Summary: “You okay, man?”Jonny forces his head up from the rim of the garbage can. It’s Patrick behind him, because of course it is. “Yeah, fucking solid,” Jonny grits out, trying to keep his voice light despite the fact that he had just finished puking his guts up.Patrick’s answer is a soft chime of laughter, then footsteps coming closer. “You know, it’s too bad, before you ran out of there I was thinking about kissing you.”





	take a walk on the wild side

**Author's Note:**

> I had most of this written for a while and had to take a break from my other series for a few days. I’ve got like 2k left to write, hopefully working on something else will help me finish that. 
> 
> As always I know none of these people, nothing is real.

“Is that Jonathan Toews, captain of the hockey team, at a frat party?”

 

“Shut up, Sharpy,” Jonny grits out, his hands tightening on the neck of his beer. He does a quick scan of the room, a blur of short dresses and grinding bodies. The music is loud, some crappy remix of an already crappy pop song blaring through vibrating speakers. In the corner, there’s a girl puking into a bucket.

 

There’s a reasonJonny doesn’t come to these sort of things. It’s not like he’s never drank before - he just prefered to do it at the cabin with his friends, not in a tightly packed room with a bunch of people he’s never met before.

 

“I’m just fucking with you,” Sharpy tells him, reaching up to loop an arm around Jonny’s shoulder. “Seriously, though, man. We’ve been asking you to come out all semester - what gives?”

 

Jonny shrugs out of his embrace, elbowing him in the ribs in the process. “Someone else asked me. Someone who isn’t a gross, sweaty hockey player.”

 

Sharpy arches a brow. “You’re a gross, sweaty hockey player,” he counters.

 

Jonny is seriously questioning his decision making skills, wondering how the hell he managed to let anyone convince him that this could be fun, when he sees him - Patrick, across the room, wearing a pair of khaki shorts and a polo shirt, hat spun around backwards. Jonny’s stomach flips a little as he watches Patrick throw his head back, laughing at something.

 

And right, that's how he was convinced to come to this dumb frat party. Patrick had asked him, with his pretty smile and baby blue eyes. The way Patrick had looked at him, well, Jonny would have probably said yes to just about anything in that moment.

 

He’s startled out of his thoughts by Sharpy clapping a hand on his shoulder and saying “alright, Tazer, go get her.”

 

He jerked his gaze back at Sharpy. “What?”

 

“The girl. Whoever has you coming to frat parties and smiling like that.”

 

“Oh, um,” Jonny fumbles for the words. He should tell Sharpy - he's been meaning too. Despite how big of a pain he's been, Jonny is actually starting to consider him one of his best friends. But from experience, Jonny knows the “I'm gay” conversation is never a quick one. And Patrick is still in view, from the corner of his eye. Jonny doesn't want to waste the night having the same conversation he's had a hundred times, when he could be with Patrick.

 

         So he says “thanks, dude,” and heads towards the kitchen even though it's the opposite direction of Patrick. He's grabs two beers and pours them into plastic cups.

 

          Patrick is still with the same group when he comes out, but he's not really talking to anyone. It's a perfect opportunity for Jonny to go over to him.

 

         “Hey,” Jonny says roughly, then clears his throat, wincing at how dumb it sounds.

 

          Patrick smiles back, baby blue eyes focused on Jonny. “Hey! You made it!”

 

         “Yeah, managed to finish that paper after all,” Jonny lies. He had actually spent the entire afternoon staring at a blank word document while thinking about way too many different scenarios of how tonight could play out.

 

         Patrick grins up at him, the same smile that’s been making Jonny’s legs feel wobbly for weeks, now. The first time Jonny had seen him was at one of their home games - Patrick was sitting by the glass in a section filled with other students. Jonny had skated by him, right after scoring a beautiful goal. Patrick had grinned at him, and Jonny had stared back, dumbfounded and awestruck by it. He had stupidly spent a lot of the game looking over his shoulder at Patrick - but he also had this ridiculous drive to impress him and ended up getting his first college hat trick. So it kind of worked out.

 

         Jonny had watched from the bench as Patrick turned to leave - and that’s when he caught sight of the Toews on the back of his jersey. That’s pretty much all it took to do him in.

 

         They’d run into each other a couple times on campus since - most recently yesterday, when Patrick had suggested Jonny come to the party one of his friends fraternity’s was having.

 

         Now that he’s here, Jonny isn’t sure what to say to him. He blurts out “want a beer?” before he can stop himself, thrusting one of the cups forward.

 

         Patrick looks down at the bottle in his hand then back at Jonny. Jonny sort of wants to die in that moment.

 

         Patrick, because he’s an A+ kind of guy, chugs the remaining half of his beer and then lays the bottle on a nearby table. “I’d love a beer,” he says while a soft smile.

 

         “Kaner, you up for a game of beer pong?” Someone calls out. Patrick looks over his shoulder, then turns back to Jonny with a mischievous expression. “You up for it?”

 

         “Course,” Jonny answers back, happy to have an opportunity to impress Patrick. Beer pong is a sport - albeit a drunken party sport - but a sport all the same. It takes coordination and concentration, things Jonny excels in.

 

         And he does impress Patrick - if the way he whistles “shit, Toews,” after Jonny has sunk his third ball in a row is any indication. “Watch out. You’re going to have to be my partner every week if you keep this up.”

 

         Jonny uses that promise as motivation to sink the next three.

 

         The thing about winning beer pong, Jonny learns, is that everyone wants to challenge you. And after two hours of playing beer pong, you get pretty fucking hammered. Jonny can’t bring himself to stop though because the drunker Patrick gets, the more touchy he gets. It starts out easy, clapping Jonny on the back when he gets one in, and moves on to wrapping his arm around him then pulling him into celebratory hugs. Jonny doesn’t want to give any of it up, so he keeps playing.

 

         “Fucking ace, man,” Patrick cries out as Jonny sinks the final ball. He’s getting sloppier, missing more than he’s hitting. But they’re still winning all the same. “Seven and oh, holy fucking shit,” Patrick’s screams right into his ear as he pulls him close.

 

        Then Patrick pulls back a little - his blue eyes search Jonny’s face, a content little smile breaking out at whatever he sees there. Jonny tries to smile back, but it’s at that exact moment that his stomach decides to roll and the nauseous that’d he’d been trying to ignore decides to surface. “Shit,” he mumbles as he pushes past Patrick and out through the back door.

 

        He makes it to a garbage can in the yard just as he spews. It feels like forever that he’s there, heaving over the disgusting can.

 

         He hears footsteps coming behind him.

 

        “You okay, man?”

 

      Jonny forces his head up from the rim of the garbage can. It’s Patrick behind him, because of course it is. “Yeah, fucking solid,” Jonny grits out, trying to keep his voice light despite the fact that he had just finished puking his guts up.

 

    Patrick’s answer is a soft chime of laughter, then footsteps coming closer. “You know, it’s too bad, before you ran out of there I was thinking about kissing you.”

 

        Jonny groans miserably. His god damn luck.

 

        “Come on.” There’s a gentle hand rubbing on the small of his back. “Your friend is looking for you, he’s going to take you home.”

 

       Jonny lets Patrick help him upright and doesn’t object when he puts his arm around his waist, supporting half his weight.

 

         “Christ, Jonny,” Sharpy says once Patrick has delivered him. “No wonder you never come to these things. Well, let’s get you home then.”

 

        Jonny is passed from Patrick to Sharpy, like some rag doll. He doesn’t have it in him to object, not even when Sharpy thanks Patrick like he were a babysitter taking care of his kid or some shit.

 

        “See ya, Jonny.” It’s punctuated with a clap on the back.

 

       “Mmm,” Jonny groans back, trying to lift his head from Sharpy’s shoulder.

 

        Patrick laughs, soft and perfect and Jonny’s not sure what’s going to be worse tomorrow - the hangover, or the realization that he ruined his chances with Patrick.

 

***

 

“There she is, sleeping beauty,” Shaw calls out as Jonny stumbles into their living room.

 

“Ah, come on, leave Tazer alone,” Sharpy says, kicking Shaw in the shin. Jonny figures he must really look like shit to have Sharpy coming to his defense. Which, he probably does look terrible because he feels like complete fucking. garbage, even though he hadn’t gotten out of bed the day before. It’s not even so much of a hangover anymore, more just wallowing in self pity.

 

Shaw grumbles that they’re all boring and gets up to head towards the kitchen.

 

“Coffee?” Seabs offers, laying a mug in front of Jonny. And bless him. Jonny sort of wants to marry him. He says as much out loud, gaining a laugh and an eye roll from Seabs.

 

Seabs had been the first teammate Jonny had told he was gay - only a few weeks into the season. It wasn’t planned or anything, just sort of blurted while they played Xbox. It was one of his easiest coming outs, ever.

 

“Thought you wanted to marry Patrick?” Sharpy says, his tone unreadable.

 

Jonny’s head snaps toward him so quick that he feels a little dizzy after. “What?” He asks, mouth going dry.

 

“That’s what you told us the other night, when we were trying to get you back here.”

 

Jonny’s eyes slide over to Seabs who nods slightly.

 

“Oh.” Jonny sighs.

 

Sharpy’s looking at him curiously. “It was him, then? The one who asked you to come to the party?”

 

This is it, then. Jonny would rather not do this now, when he’s groggy and miserable but. It’s pretty much done, anyway. “Yeah, it was Patrick.”

 

Sharpy nods. “Okay. You could have told me, you know.”

 

“I know. I was planning on it - honestly. Just...” Jonny trails off, looking down at his hands.

 

“Okay, just wanted to make sure you knew.” Sharpy smiles then. “So, Patrick huh?”

 

Jonny blows out a long breath. “Doesn’t matter now, pretty sure I ruined that. The whole puking and all.” He winces. No matter how many times he’s replayed it in his head, it still makes his cheeks burn with embarrassment.

 

“Just call him,” Sharpy insists.

 

“Don’t have his number. Don’t know where he lives, what classes he’s taking. I only ever really see him at our games - couple times at the gym. That’s all.”

 

Sharpy looks thoughtful for a moment - which in Jonny’s experience, is never a good thing for him.

 

“He’s a hockey fan?” Sharpy asks, brows still furrowed.

 

“Seems to be, yeah,” Jonny says glumly, sinking down further into the couch. He needs to go back to bed and sleep for like, another ten hours minimum.

 

“Okay. So we throw a party. No way he doesn’t show up to a party hosted by the hockey team.” Sharpy grins proudly, like it’s the best plan anyone has ever had.

 

Jonny’s stomach jumps at the mention of a party - he doesn’t want to drink again for like, at least a month.

 

“Where would we have a party?” Seabs interjects, the voice of reason. “No way are we having a party here. Everything will be sticky for months.”

 

Sharpy waves his hand in the air. “We’ll figure all that stuff out later. What’s important here is that we get our little Jonny laid.”

 

Jonny sinks further down into the couch cushions. This can only go terrible for him.

 

***

 

With their hockey schedule, it turns out they can’t have a party for two weeks. Jonny had naturally assumed Sharpy would give up on the plan - but here they are, Friday night, packed tightly into their student house (much to Seabs annoyance.)

 

Jonny hasn’t seen Patrick again since the party - not even at their home game yesterday. So he’s not really surprised when he doesn’t see him at the party. He’s disappointed nonetheless.

 

He spends the first little while going around, picking up half empty beer cans and red solo cups that people have left around. And then he heads up to his room shortly after, in no mood to party.

 

He’s looking over his economics notes when gets a text from Sharpy that says where the fuck are you. Jonny rolls his eyes and puts his phone back on his nightstand, resuming his studying. His phone buzzes a couple more times.

 

Get down here. Patrick is here.

 

Jonny!!! Wtf

 

Patrick is talking to some other guy

 

Jonny jumps up immediately, eyes wide as he stares down at the phone. Okay. So Patrick is here. No big deal, he can do this. They had a great time last time - until Jonny had ruined it of course.

 

He takes a deep breath and heads down the stairs. Sharpy is practically waiting for him at the bottom of them. He smacks Jonny on the shoulder then jerks his head over to where Patrick is standing with his back to them, talking to some guy from the basketball team.

 

Jonmy shrugs dumbly, studying the back of Patrick - taking in his loose jeans and signature hat turned around backwards, curls poking out underneath. “What am I supposed to do?”

 

Sharpy rolls his eyes and sighs like Jonny is the stupidest person in the world. “Yo, Patrick,” he shouts suddenly. “Jonny needs a partner for beer pong. You in?”

 

Patrick turns, brows furrowed, but his eyes light up when he sees Jonny. “Hey. Yeah, man, of course.” He smiles brightly- Jonny has to duck his head and jam his hands in his pockets to hide his excitement. It’s a little ridiculous.

 

Patrick leaves the guy he was talking to and comes over to join Jonny and Sharpy. “How’s it going?” He asks, eyes locked straight on Jonny’s.

 

“Uh, yeah, good,” Jonny stumbles pathetically. He hears Sharpy snort from beside him. Jonny resists the urge to kick him in the shin and asks Patrick. “You?”

 

Patrick grins at Jonny. “A lot better now.” And like, Jonny knows that Patrick is flirting with him. And he knows how to flirt back - he’s not an idiot, he’s actually quite good at picking up. But something about Patrick is different and it makes Jonny just let out a nervous laugh.

 

It was easier when he was drunk.

 

“Alright, come on, let me kick your stupid asses,” Sharpy says, calling Seabs over.

 

“Good luck, we’re like, the dream team,” Patrick responds, throwing his arm around Jonny’s waist and pulling him closer.

 

“Fucking right,” Jonny agrees, his hand curling around Patrick’s waist. And judging by the wink Patrick gives him, it was the right move. He just needs to relax.

 

Jonny and Patrick win, of course - keeping up their undefeated streak. Seabs gets pissy and demands a rematch, but Jonny just flips him off and asks Patrick if he wants to go out on the deck.

 

There’s a couple people out in their backyard, tossing around a frisbee. Jonny brings Patrick to the far side of the deck, by the BBQ.

 

“Want another beer?” Patrick asks before he sits on the stairs next to Jonny. “Yours is practically empty.”

 

“Nah.” He’s been nursing the same one for a while. “Trying to pace myself a little better tonight.”

 

Patrick smiles back. “Alright, cool. How bad was your hangover after?”

 

Wincing, Jonny says “I didn’t get out of bed for like, two days.”

 

Patrick laughs brightly. “Been there, trust me.”

 

“So, you’re a hockey fan?” Jonny asks.

 

“Maybe,” Patrick responds, shrugging. “Maybe I’m just a fan of the hockey captain.”

 

“I mean, I did hear that you wear his jersey,” Jonny counters back, his stomach flipping excitedly.

 

Patrick grins wider. “I am a hockey fan, though. I used to play - I was actually pretty good. But then I fucked up my wrist and couldn’t play anymore.”

 

“Oh shit, really?” Jonny remembers the time he dislocated his knee in his senior year - the talks he had about his mom about what he would do if he didn’t have hockey. It was the scariest time in his life.

 

Patrick shrugs. “We played against each other once. You probably don’t remember - it was a tournament in Edmonton... I was on the junior flyers. I stopped playing a year later-”

 

“Kane?” Jonny says, remembering suddenly. He hadn’t realized he didn’t know Patrick’s last name until that moment. “Patrick Kane?”

 

Patrick smiles a little - but it’s kind of sad. “Yeah, Patrick Kane.”

 

“Yeah, I remember. You guys beat us-”

 

“And you got a hat trick.”

 

Jonny smiles. “Yeah. Everyone on my team was talking about you though - I wondered what happened...”

 

“Well now you know,” Patrick says, holding up his wrist.

 

“I’m sorry,” Jonny says, because he doesn’t know what else to say.

 

Patrick shrugs easily in response. He scoots a little closer, their bare knees touching. “Hey, remember how I said I was planning on kissing you?”

 

Jonny pulls his lips inwards to hide the giant smile trying to break through. “Vaguely,” he lies.

 

“Think we could try that again?”

 

Jonny swallows hard and nods. No one has ever asked to kiss him before. He likes that about Patrick.

 

“I think that’d be alright.” Jonny isn’t sure if he should lean in or wait for Patrick. He bites down on his lip. He doesn’t have to think about it for long though, because next thing he knows Patrick’s lips are on his, warm and soft and everything Jonny has been hoping for for weeks.

 

Patrick pulls back and for the first time since Jonny had crossed paths with him, he looked a little shy and unsure.

 

So, Jonny figures it’s his time to take the lead here. He’s been letting Patrick do that all along.

 

“Think you’d let me take you out sometime?”

 

Patrick smiles back, all toothy and sweet and it makes Jonny’s stomach flip.

 

“Yeah, man,” he nods, still smiling. “Kind of got a thing for hockey players.” He winks then and Jonny laughs back, feeling like he’d just scored the game winning goal.

  
  
  
  


         

 

         

 

         


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